The Board has dismissed the Veteran's claim for service connection for an acquired psychiatric disorder as secondary to his service-connected sinusitis because a grant of service connection was made in June 2019. The Board also denied the Veteran's claim for service connection for bilateral hearing loss, finding that it is not related to his service or his service-connected sinusitis.
The deciding factor: The VA examiner opined that the Veteran’s current sensorineural hearing loss is less likely than not due to or caused by his service-connected sinusitis and more likely due to post-service noise exposure.
- Claimed conditions
- Acquired psychiatric disorder, Bilateral hearing loss
- How they argued it
- Secondary to another service-connected condition
- Exposure basis
- None
- Rating assigned
- None in this decision
- Decision date
- November 7, 2019
- Citation
- 19184296
What this means for you
A dismissal means the Board did not decide the issue on its merits — usually because it was withdrawn or had become moot. It says more about procedure than about whether a claim like this can win.
What you can do next
Related decisions
Other Board decisions on a similar condition or argued the same way.
- Denied
The Board denied the veteran's claim for service connection for bilateral hearing loss, as there was no evidence of a current disability in the right ear and insufficient evidence to establish a nexus between the left ear hearing loss and service.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board remands the matter for a medical clarification regarding whether the Veteran's service-connected epilepsy has aggravated his bilateral hearing loss.
- Remanded (sent back)
The Board remands the claim for service connection for bilateral hearing loss to obtain an addendum opinion addressing the Veteran's lay statements regarding in-service acoustic trauma and a rocket blast injury.
- Partly granted
The Board granted an effective date of May 17, 2019, for a 70 percent disability rating for PTSD but denied earlier effective dates for service connection for bilateral hearing loss and tinnitus.
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